#19th Century

Masterpiece Stories

Masterpiece Story: Little Girl in a Blue Armchair by Mary Cassatt

Mary Stevenson Cassatt was an American painter and printmaker. She lived much of her adult life in France, where she became friends with Edgar Degas...

Zuzanna Stańska 29 December 2022

Edgar Degas, Blue Dancers, 1899, Pushkin Museum, Moscow, Russia Impressionism

Edgar Degas and His Most Beautiful Ballerinas

Edgar Degas was one of the founding artists of Impressionism, however, he didn’t like the term and preferred to call it “Realist” or...

Zuzanna Stańska 27 December 2022

Hokusai Great Wave, Katsushika Hokusai, Under the Wave off Kanagawa, Thirty-six Views of Mount Fuji, ca. 1830-1832, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY, USA. Asian Art

Hokusai’s Great Wave Explained

You might not know the title of Hokusai’s print, but Under the Wave off Kanagawa is almost instantly recognizable. His Great Wave reveals...

Marina Kochetkova 26 December 2022

Masterpiece Stories

Masterpiece Story: The Courtesan Hinaaya of the Chōji House by Kikukawa Eizan

The Courtesan Hinaaya of the Chōji House by Kikukawa Eizan, is one of the woodblock prints from Vincent and Theo van Gogh’s collection in the Van...

Urvi Chheda 26 December 2022

Theater & Cinema

The Scenes You Might Know from Anime: Outstanding Prints of Hasui Kawase

Hasui Kawase (1883–1957) was one of Japan’s most important and prolific printmakers and artists of the late 19th and early-20th centuries. As a...

Isabella Hill 26 December 2022

Post-Impressionism

Vincent van Gogh Copying Other Artists

Vincent van Gogh is famous today for two reasons. Firstly, his unstoppable creativity. He produced 2,100 artworks in just over a decade. And,...

Anastasia Manioudaki 22 December 2022

Giovanni Segantini, The Punishment of Lust, 1891, Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, UK. Artist Stories

Giovanni Segantini: A Snowy Story with a Sad End

December is a month of snow (for those in the colder corners of the world…), hot chocolates with marshmallows, and mince pies. I’m slowly...

Magda Michalska 21 December 2022

Painting

Snowy Siberian Winter in Konstantin Korovin’s Eyes

If one thinks of winter in Siberia, one usually imagines loads of snow, fur hats, and hip flasks filled with some warming drink. What was winter like...

Magda Michalska 21 December 2022

spirit victorian photography Photography

The Spectacle of Victorian Spirit Photography

Is seeing believing? In 19th-century London, this question captivated everyone who entered Frederick Hudson’s spirit photography studio—from...

Emily Snow 20 December 2022

Photography

The True Star of Early Photography: Virginia Oldoini

Virginia Elisabetta Luisa Antonietta Teresa Maria Oldoini – in short, Countess of Castiglione – was a real celebrity of her times. I imagine that...

Zuzanna Stańska 20 December 2022

Photography

Julia Margaret Cameron – The Queen of Pre-Raphaelite Photography

The English Victorian artist Julia Margaret Cameron (who was actually born in India and raised in France) was an irreplaceable representative of...

Rute Ferreira 20 December 2022

Photography

Capturing Light: The Pioneers of Photography in France

It all officially began in 1839 in two countries at the same time: in the UK, the Royal Academy announced the discovery of a method of capturing...

Magda Michalska 20 December 2022